1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to computerized mold design and production management systems and methods, and especially to a management system and method for monitoring and controlling operations of different phases of mold design and production.
2. Description of the Related Art
Present-day product design is in most cases carried out by means of CAD (Computer Aided Design). Accordingly, molds for the products are also designed based on CAD data of the products. In a typical case, data of a product shape are first input into a CAD system. Then the product shape or the mold block is depicted on a display. The displayed mold block is a virtual block illustrating an outer shape of the mold, and shows a cavity corresponding to the product shape. When viewing the display, a designer can draw a parting line on the screen to form a parting plane. The CAD system can thus output numeric data to form two mold halves according to the conditions set by the designer.
The art of mold design using a CAD system has been disclosed in a number of patents. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,546,362 issued on Apr. 8, 2003 and entitled Mold Design System and Recording Medium provides a system for designing a shape of a mold used to manufacture molded products, the mold shape being based on a given product shape. Another example is in U.S. Pat. No. 6,304,794, issued on Oct. 16, 2001 and entitled Method for Designing a Metal Mold. This patent discloses a method for the design of metal molds for plastic products, which can shorten the time required for the molding process.
The above described systems and methods are directed to managing only the first phase of mold formation, namely mold design. Monitoring of subsequent phases such as mold machining, mold assembly and mold testing is not provided. In most cases, cooperation between various departments of a mold design organization during different phases is required for designing a satisfactory mold. Similarly, the whole process from design through production and testing of a mold should be under the control of corresponding designers. If so, when a problem occurs in any phase of the process, the designers can address the problem timely, and modify originally designed drawings or redesign the drawings according to the customer's requirements. In this way, design costs can be reduced, and design efficiency improved.